The final Transcendental Virtue in our series is Wisdom. Deep Wisdom supports and informs all the other virtues and our activities in daily life. But what do we mean by Wisdom?
Let’s get a little help from the descriptions in the book Buddha Is as Buddha Does, by Lama Surya Das.
The basic definition of wisdom in Buddhism has two parts: the absolute and the relative.
The absolute wisdom is what Buddhists call Right View, or seeing things as they really are, beyond our habitual patterns of conceptual thought.
The relative wisdom is called Right Understanding, a selfless understanding of our interconnectedness with all things, having right intentions in our actions, and understanding karma. Relative wisdom is practical and learnable understanding of how things operate in the ever-changing world.
Relative wisdom implies deep understanding about patterns and relationships, causes and origins, as well as insight into the implications of our thoughts, words, and deeds. The more we understand, the more we grow into a state of equanimity, integration of the various parts of ourselves, and a transcendent connection with all life.
The practices the we engage with each week have elements that support the awakening of both Relative and Absolute wisdom. There are several phases to our practice, some working with awakening our Relative wisdom and some our Absolute wisdom.
When we enter into our practice of Receiving loving care, or benefactor meditation, we are accessing qualities that are already part of our true nature: openness, clarity, and compassion. The practices strengthen our connection with these qualities so they become stronger in our own life and in our interactions with others. We begin to see that we can respond in more skillful ways to all that we experience and that leads to greater happiness for ourselves and all those we interact with.
Through the Extending practice, we begin to share these qualities with others. We recognize that others have difficult feelings and suffer, just as we do, and with time, we begin to see others as just like us in needing and wanting to be well and happy in their lives. Then we can let go of our labels of ‘friends, strangers, or difficult ones’ and see the deep goodness in others, and our deep connection with all beings.
When we engage the Compassionate Mindfulness of Feelings practice, we learn to honor our feelings, welcoming and accepting them just as they are, without needing to push them away or change them. We are able to be present to our emotions with a greater sense of equanimity. We begin to see the transitory nature of feelings. We also open our awareness to the wisdom present in all of our feeling experience. These aspects all support Relative Wisdom.
In the last phase of our practice, we let the mind relax all the frameworks of thinking, relax and fall completely open. We rest in the natural openness of the mind, the basic space of awareness, letting all patterns of thought or feeling just unwind and release. We let everything that arises be, just as it is, beyond the patterns of conceptual thought. This is the Absolute view.
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